


Hiraeth

by ElisabethMonroe



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Gen, Panic Attacks, Pining, Unrequited Crush, Unrequited Love, You know what that is? Growth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-18
Updated: 2019-08-18
Packaged: 2020-09-06 21:23:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20298166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElisabethMonroe/pseuds/ElisabethMonroe
Summary: Hiraeth -- the homesickness, longing, nostalgia, and yearning, for a home that you cannot return to, no longer exists, or maybe never wasIn which: Adam seeks Gansey out





	Hiraeth

The door to Monmouth opened and then there was sobbing in the living room. Gansey wasn’t sure what possessed him, but he checked the time before he got up to help. It must have been something left over from living with Ronan for years. Not that Ronan kept anything close to a schedule, but Gansey could usually figure out what had gone wrong at what point in the night based on when Ronan came stumbling back into the factory.

But Ronan lived in the Barns now and he rarely cried anyway. And, sometimes, Ronan was very good about seeking out warmth and companionship straight from Gansey, instead of waiting for Gansey to come to him. So it was likely not Ronan in the living room.

Gansey removed the needle from his record player and pulled on shorts over his boxers and checked the stench of his shirt. He’d been locked up in Noah’s old room all day, rearranging Monmouth now that no one else lived there, and the sadness and melancholy had seemed to manifest in his sweat for some reason. But whomever was outside was likely a friend and not one who would care that Gansey smelled like dust and change and longing.

Adam would actually probably appreciate that he smelled bad.

Gansey slowly made his way out to the living room, keeping his steps a little heavy so they’d thud-thud-thud for Adam, so Adam could clock him all the way down the hall and towards the couch. Not that Adam was sitting on the couch. He looked like he’d crumbled down while circling it. He was off to the far side, towards Ronan’s room, curled up with his face in his knees, arms around his legs.

“Adam?” Gansey tried tentatively.

The mild rocking stopped, but Adam didn’t lift his head and the sobbing didn’t ease up, other than a gasping, stuttering breath. Gansey slowly squatted down about an arm’s length from Adam.

“Hey, did you and Ronan fight?” he asked. The last time he’d seen Adam break down like this had been back before everything had fallen apart and fallen together, when they were still just silly boys with a weekend hobby. And it had been Ronan’s fault that time. Adam was cruelly good at finding the exact thing that would cut the deepest in an argument, but Ronan could throw it back just as fiercely.

Gansey couldn’t remember what the fight was about, but he remembered sitting next to Adam on the couch of Monmouth, staring at something he never thought he’d see. And just as soon as he’d reached out for Adam’s shoulder, Ronan was there, looking frantic and angry, scowling and hurt.

“Don’t fucking touch him,” he’d snarled and Gansey had known it wasn’t because Ronan was being possessive or mean. Adam had flinched away at the slightest movement from Gansey and who knew what he would have done if Gansey’s hand had come down on his shoulder, smoothed over his back. They were all damaged creatures, but Gansey knew touch was something Adam had problems processing, even if he didn’t have all the proof of ‘why.’

But that was over two years ago and Adam sometimes felt like a different person, a different story. Something fixed instead of damaged. Still, Gansey controlled himself and reached for a blanket on the couch instead, throwing it over Adam’s shoulders as much as he could. It still mostly landed on his face, but, slowly, Adam freed some fingers to curl around the tassels and pull it down.

“Do you want to talk to me?” Gansey asked. A year ago, it would have been a stupid question. For all the adoration Gansey had for Adam, sometimes it didn’t feel reciprocated. Hell, Gansey knew it wasn’t reciprocated in the same, but knowing that Adam wouldn’t ever come to Gansey first with a problem had hurt more than knowing they each had someone else to adore. But now they’d grown and pain had been let out and goals were achieved and Gansey and Adam had drifted closer again, how they’d been when Adam had first come to Aglionby. Before Cabeswater, before scrying, before Blue, before Ronan.

Gansey still didn’t have a name for how he felt about Adam. Maybe that wasn’t true. Maybe he just didn’t want to accept how he felt about Adam and how Adam didn’t feel about him. Another shuddering sob drew him from his thoughts and he shifted forward a little bit. Ronan be damned, he held his hand out towards Adam.

“Come on, Adam. Talk to me. What happened?” he pressed again. And suddenly a million terrible things went through his mind. “Ronan is okay, right? He’s fine, isn’t he? Nothing happened.”

Adam shook his head and slowly, terribly slowly let go of the blanket to reach for Gansey’s hand. This all felt very much like when Gansey and Helen had been young and a fox had gotten into their father’s garden and they’d spent hours outside trying to coax it out of the hole it had buried itself in. Somehow, this felt more dangerous.

Adam’s fingers brushed along Gansey’s, down his palm and over his wrist until Adam could pull himself closer, using Gansey’s outstretched arm as a life-line. Gansey eventually turned his hand over to hold Adam’s forearm, pulling him into his lap. Adam crashed into Gansey, knocking them back against the side of the couch, but didn’t move away afterwards. Gansey couldn’t tell if he was breathless from the fall or from Adam being pressed so close to him. He could feel Adam’s thighs on the outside of his own, the hammering of Adam’s heart against his chest, Adam’s breath coming in short, hot pants against his collarbone where Adam’s face was hidden in Gansey’s neck.

Now Gansey wanted to sob. Instead, he freed a hand to bring it up to the back of Adam’s head, getting his other arm around Adam’s waist. Adam let him, arms going lax around Gansey’s sides, fingers occasionally grabbing for the edge of Gansey’s shirt.

All at once, Gansey was aware of how few layers were between them. Old gym shorts and thin boxers and whatever frayed things Adam was wearing. But Adam still wasn’t Gansey’s to want or think of like that. Adam hadn’t chosen him. Still, he held onto him, turning his face to press his mouth against Adam’s temple, trying to assure he it was okay, he was right there. It just broke another cry from Adam. Gansey felt his fingers pull on his shirt again and he held onto Adam tighter too.

“What’s wrong, Adam? I don’t know what to do.” And where was Ronan? Why hadn’t he gone to Ronan? Why was he crying in Gansey’s arms instead of the Barns. And why could Adam Parrish always find problems that Gansey had no answer for?

“I don’t want to go,” Adam sobbed just as soon as Gansey was getting ready to repeat himself.

“No, of course, I’m not going to send you away,” Gansey said quickly, fingers curling in the back of Adam’s shirt. He could keep Adam right in front of him for the rest of his life and not get tired of it.

“I-I-I mean Henrietta.”

And it took Gansey too long to understand the short sentence. As long as he’d known Adam, every iteration and growth and facet of him, getting out of Henrietta had been the goal. Gansey had been surprised Adam hadn’t wanted to go on the road trip with them. He’d elected to stay with…

“Oh,” he whispered softly. His fingers relaxed in Adam’s shirt slightly. He didn’t mean to. It’s just that all the fight and hope and fear had flooded out of his system all at once.

“It had never been home. But...but… But…”

“But the Barns are home,” Gansey hazarded.

“_ Ronan _ is home,” Adam whimpered.

Gansey blinked quickly, keeping Adam’s head tucked against his head so he couldn’t see the tears welling up in Gansey’s eyes. Gansey had a true love, dammit. The death certificate to prove it. And Ronan and Adam were about as perfect for each other as two people could get. Gansey was in love with Blue so fully it made him lightheaded sometimes, so why couldn’t he just get over how much he _ loved _Adam?

“Ronan isn’t going anywhere,” Gansey said, ashamed at how wrecked his voice was, the fade of it as he swallowed down tears. “He’s so in love with you. He’s willing to wait for you, to chase you down, to welcome you back with open arms.”

“I don’t want to have to do this without him,” Adam said. “I’m-I’m-I’m having a panic attack over it. I can’t think straight. I just…”

“Adam, it’s alright, you don’t have to think about it. It’s still a month off,” Gansey assured softly. He forced his hands to listen to his arms to listen to his brain and rubbed Adam’s back.

“I don’t even know how to sleep without him. I can’t wake up day after day without him.”

“Adam, you’re just upsetting yourself. Calm down. You’ll be able to sleep without him.”

“You don’t know that. You don’t…” Adam didn’t finish his sentence, but Gansey figured he knew where it was going anyway. And did he know? Did he know what it was like? Blue and he made each other quiet, but Ronan and Adam made each other still. And Gansey wasn’t sure he could ever give up being still, if he’d ever found it. Blue made him want to be a better person, to change the world and how had that never been a goal of his before? Why didn’t he love the world before he saw her run her fingers over dandelion heads to send the seeds bursting free? And she quieted his thoughts at night, but she didn’t help him sleep and he didn’t have to fall asleep with her against his chest, even if he liked it. Did they have the codependency that Ronan and Adam apparently did? And how had the two most independent men Gansey had ever met become so tied up in each other that there was no room for Gansey anymore? Was this his fault? Had he left a space in each of them for the other to fall into? 

“Why didn’t you apply? Why aren’t you coming with me?” Adam asked and the breath stopped in Gansey’s lungs. He stared at longer, wispy curls on top of Adam’s head, wide eyed and unbelieving.

“What?” he asked.

“You could be at Harvard too.”

And that had never been Gansey’s intention. He refused to follow in his parents’ footsteps. In fact, higher education in general had never settled well with him. He knew he’d become an eternal student, never finishing a degree or constantly seeking another, higher course of study. There was too much in the world to learn to be stuck in a college. He was going to South America with Blue. He was following Henry to California. He was studying with Malory on Oxford’s campus. Harvard had never been in the plan.

Adam had never asked him. Adam would have tormented him if he’d applied and accepted a term at Harvard. Raged about Gansey’s privilege and the legacy system and funds and decisions made at the drop of a hat. But now Adam was asking him, begging him to be with him. To _ help _him. Which was another thing Gansey had never seen from Adam.

“You’re upset. You’re not making sense. You don’t want me bugging you up there,” he muttered, smoothing his palm along Adam’s spine. 

Adam shook his head, wet cheek pulling across Gansey’s shoulder. “I want you there. You always make me stronger. Smarter.”

“Yeah, but only because you’re always trying to make me look bad,” Gansey said. “You can carry that spirit without me sitting there.”

“I want my best friend there.”

“I thought you wanted your boyfriend there.”

“I want to stay here,” Adam said quickly, half a wail of anguish.

Gansey sighed and got a hand against Adam’s collarbone area, pushing him back. Adam whimpered, but didn’t fight his way back to Gansey’s shoulder. He brought his hands up to Gansey’s arm, holding onto him. Gansey tried not to get distracted by the rough calluses rubbing at his skin. “Adam, you’ve never wanted to stay here. Making peace with a place is not wanting to stay. Me and Ronan aren’t Henrietta.”

“But how am I supposed to keep you if you aren’t with me, if I’m not with you?” Adam asked.

“We’re not going anywhere. Adam, this is a moment of growth for all of us. And, yeah, it feels like we’re branching out further away from each other, but all of our trunks and roots are still right next to each other, tangled together, even.”

Adam got a palm against Gansey’s cheek and Gansey felt a hot flush erupt under his hand. God, he had to calm down. _ Ronan _got to have a fetish about Adam’s hands. Not Gansey. “You’ve just got cold feet, Adam,” he managed to mutter, fingers going to Adam’s wrist gently. “You don’t want to stay here.”

“I want you,” Adam muttered, leaning into Gansey’s space again, temple against temple, arm around his ribs. Gansey took in a stuttering breath.

“You’ve worked so hard for Harvard. You just want something you don’t have to work for right now. And I’ll always be here for that. But you’ve got to do Harvard too.”

“What? What do you mean that I don’t want to work?” Adam asked, sounding defensive even though he only turned his head a little against Gansey’s.

“You’ve got me, Adam. No matter what. I mean, I think we’ve pretty much proven that at this point, haven’t we? We’re together. And I’m always gonna be around to catch you. A soft spot to land, right?”

Adam nodded against Gansey’s cheek. “You’re not easy, Gansey. We work so hard for each other.”

Loving Adam Parrish was ridiculously easy for Gansey, but he supposed that the fighting and the eggshells and the opinions were a little more work. Still, it had never really felt like _ work _though. Not recently, not like this. It was just something that he did to keep Adam. To keep his chest brushing against Gansey’s like this and the confidential tears that he’d never seen before.

“What do you do when you’re scared?” Adam asked.

Gansey thought of all the times he hadn’t confessed something to Adam, of all the moments he let Ronan’s personality over take his, let someone else steal Adam’s bright gaze from Gansey’s own elation.

“I don’t know. Sometimes I run away. But usually I run right at it. I don’t think.” Adam had been the only time he really thought about something and here he was now. “All the good things happen when I don’t think, when I just take it on. Harvard is going to be so good for you, Adam. You’re gonna look back on this and laugh, right?”

“I can’t imagine ever laughing about this.”

“That’s because you’re still scared. Trust me, in six months, you’re gonna be fine.”

Adam made a soft sound and dropped his face to Gansey’s shoulder. Gansey counted fifteen breaths before Adam was climbing out of his lap to collapse against the side of the couch with Gansey.

“I’m sorry,” he muttered, wiping away the tears on his cheeks. Gansey slowly reached up for a few that had collected against his jaw.

“Don’t apologize, Adam. We’re supposed to be here for each other. You’ve helped me through rough spots.”

Maybe Adam forgot where he was, or who he was with, but he leaned into Gansey’s touch, eyes closed, mouth soft. It would be so easy to just catch the corner of his mouth…

Gansey brushed his thumb over Adam’s jaw before dropping his hand and looking away. “I assume you don’t want Ronan to know what happened?” In vastly different ways than Gansey didn’t want Ronan to know.

Adam nodded raggedly and sagged against Gansey’s side. “Can I sleep here for a few hours?”

Gansey nodded back. “As long as you want.” Eight more breaths before Adam’s fingers suddenly found his on the floor of Monmouth, clutching at them like a lifeline again.

**Author's Note:**

> Be mopey about Richard Campbell Gansey III with me [on tumblr here](https://abarbaricyalp.tumblr.com/)


End file.
